


The night calls to dreamers

by peujeune, wearetheluckyones



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Anal Fingering, Anal Sex, Angst, Canon Divergence, Implied/Referenced Sexual Assault, M/M, Panic Attacks, Set During an Alternate Seventh Year
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-22
Updated: 2019-01-22
Packaged: 2019-10-14 08:24:51
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,954
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17505068
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/peujeune/pseuds/peujeune, https://archiveofourown.org/users/wearetheluckyones/pseuds/wearetheluckyones
Summary: In the months leading up to The Final Battle, Severus finds comfort in the one person he least expected.





	The night calls to dreamers

**Author's Note:**

> Canon Divergence in where Dumbledore is alive, The Order is searching for the horcruxes in Harry's stead and Harry is at Hogwarts.
> 
> Normally any non-One Direction pairing goes to my other account but I honestly couldn’t be bothered, so.
> 
> Title from Insomnia by Zayn.
> 
> Update: a lovely reader let me know I had a few spelling mistakes in here, and I was telling her I have a terrible habit of posting things and not going back to beta them for six months. I’ve fixed what she suggested, but if anyone sees anymore mistakes, please let me know so I can change them! Thank you.

Severus Snape wanted desperately to sleep; to lie down and close his eyes and just _sleep_ , unhindered by the presence of nightmares and psychopaths with no nose and twinkling old men that swear they're doing the right thing. He wanted to sleep and sleep for ever, maybe until the damned war was over and Voldemort was a big ol' pile of ash.

He feels the knock on his door before it comes, the brush of a hand against his wards. It's almost three in the morning, and Severus decides that whoever it is has to be dying, or Voldemort and the Death Eaters have to be storming the castle, or Severus just might cut the visitors head off and stick it on his wall. 

The knock isn't urgent enough, it's slow and soft, like the person attached to the hand isn't even sure they want Severus to answer.

His knees and shoulders groan and crack as he stands, leaving his firewhiskey on the table while he approaches the door, with something close to apprehension, if not complete dread.

Behind the door, standing with his head bowed, his glasses falling off his nose, and wand in one hand against his side is Harry Potter. Severus wishes with all his soul - what's left of it, anyway - that he'd never answered the door.

"What on earth are you doing on my doorstep at three in the morning, Potter?" He asks, voice scathing, glaring down at the figure.

The boy gazes up, only for a second before he's looking down at his feet again, and Severus realises he's been crying. Eyes bloodshot and cheeks red, wet with tears. "I wondered if- if I might come in, Professor?"

Severus is so perturbed by Potter's rather suspicious appearance, let alone his request, that it takes him a long time to answer, long enough for Potter to believe the answer a no and begin turning away. 

"You may... come in." Severus consents, stepping aside to let the boy in.

Potter shuffles in past him and looks around at Severus's quarters. He doesn't look for long before he's look down at his feet again.

"Perhaps a cup of tea, Mr Potter?" Severus offers.

"I was-" The boy pauses. "I was wondering if-"

"I would appreciate it if you would look at me when you speak to me."

Potter blinks up and lifts his glasses to wipe at his eyes before he continues. "I was wondering if you had anything a bit stronger?"

Severus gives the boy a considering look before he nods his assent, finds the firewhiskey and another glass, pouring Potter a finger. "Please take a seat. And tell me what brought you to my quarters so late at night."

Potter watches Severus for a long moment, like he's almost scared to comply, as if he thinks Severus will take the offer back and hex him out the door. Finally, he takes a seat, right in the corner of the lounge, his legs up against his chest, the glasses of firewhiskey perched precariously on his knees, only his thumb and forefinger there to hold it steady.

Severus takes his own seat on the opposite side and finds his own glass, turning so he's facing Potter head on. "So, why were you crying, Mr Potter?"

The boy swallows down half his drink before he answers, making a face when it slides down his throat. "Had a nightmare."

"I was under the impression that your connection with Voldemort was hindered." Severus replies.

"It is. The... the nightmares are different. About other things."

"Do you feel comfortable telling me what tonight's nightmare entailed?" Severus asks, drinking down some of his firewhiskey, watching the boy over the rim of the glass.

"Cedric. When he... when he died. When I couldn't-" he cuts himself off and shakes his head. "It doesn't matter." He swallows down the rest of his firewhiskey and presses the glass against his forehead.

"It does matter, Mr Potter." Severus tells him, taking the glass and refilling it. "I can assure you that whatever you say to me will stay in the strictest confidence."

"I know." Potter replies, nodding, accepting the glass Severus hands him. He takes a deep gulp of the amber liquid and says, "I had a mad crush on him, y'know. Thought he hung the moon."

"Are you," Severus is surprised at the admission, but he takes it in stride, searching for the right words. "Unhappy? Discovering your sexual desires?"

Potter looks up at him again and shakes his head. "No. I haven't... well you're the first person I've told, but I'm not unhappy about it." He pauses and takes another sip of firewhiskey. "I couldn't save him."

"It is not your fault, you understand?"

Potter nods. "I know. But knowing it doesn't stop me from feeling guilty." The boy picks at a loose thread in his pyjama pants and sighs. "I'm scared, Professor, so fucking scared I'm going to die. I don't want to die." The boy's crying again, and it makes Severus uncomfortable. He knows how to comfort his snakes, the homesick first years and the mentally exhausted seventh years, but Harry Potter is an entirely different story. "I came here because I wanted... I wanted... well I think I need someone to tell me to buck up, don't I? Save the world and what have you."

Severus's fingers itch with the need to reach out and rest a hand on his shoulder, just do _something_ to tell the boy he wasn't alone. "I am not going to tell you that, Harry." Potter blinks up at him again. "As loathe as I am to admit, you are very important, yes, but you are also seventeen and facing certain death, you have the right to cry, and the right to scream. Curse Merlin and god and everyone who might be pulling the strings of fate. It is not fair. It isn't. You are a child, sent into war by adults who should know better."

Potter wipes at his eyes again. "Why are you saying this? Why aren't you... why aren't you calling me names and insulting me?"

"While it might be amusing in the classroom, right here and now, where you are most vulnerable, it will burrow under all the layers you keep to protect yourself and plant itself where you are most broken." Severus pauses. "You may come here, if you would like."

Potter does not hesitate to burrow himself against Severus's side, his wet face in Severus's throat, his body wracking with silent sobs. Severus wraps an arm around the boy's shoulders and runs the fingers from the other through the messy black hair, using his nails to scratch at the scalp soothingly, to calm the boy.

If you had told Severus months ago that he'd be comforting The Chosen One like this, he would have called you a madman. But right here and now, with the war on their doorstep and a madman out for both their blood, Severus does not find it so mad.

-*-*-

Severus had believed Potter's nighttime visit to be no more than a one time occurrence for less than three days before the boy was back on his doorstep, wearing a jumper three sizes to big, and more tears in his eyes.

He ushers the boy inside and shuts the door behind them, pouring Potter a glass of firewhiskey and handing it to him when he sits down in the couch, in his corner with his legs against his chest and his chin on his knees.

"Another nightmare?" Severus asks, pouring himself his own glass of firewhiskey.

"Yes, sir." Potter replies, gulping down as much as he can of the drink. "'bout Sirius." He settles the glass back on his knee and wraps the hand that isn't holding it around his ankle. "It wasn't a nightmare, not really."

Severus wants to tell him that he does not have to disclose the nature of his dream, but he feels that if he did, Potter would take it as a sign he didn't want to listen to a tale of Sirius Black. Not that he did. He just wanted to the boy to unburden himself without the fear of being judged.

"I dreamt Voldemort had died the day my parents had, and I lived with Sirius, and everything was just... happy. It was when I woke up, and realised the world I lived in meant I could never be happy, never find peace..." Potter shakes his head, as if to shake away the last of his unfinished sentence. "I'll never marry, never have children. I'll be dead as soon as Voldemort decides I'm ready to die. I want to die on my own terms." He shakes his head again.

"It is no secret I did not much care for your godfather, but I know that if he had raised you, you would have been happy," Severus says, taking one of the boy's hands in his own, squeezing comfortingly. "You would have been loved, he would have loved you as his own, that I can say with absolute certainty."

Potter sniffles and nods, putting his glass on the table beside the couch. "I wish everything was different. It's stupid and unrealistic, but I do."

Severus takes the boy into his chest and holds him close, soothing him with words and soft touches. He doesn't cry this time, but he shakes, whole body wracking with it.

-*-*-

Severus is expecting Potter the third time he visits, almost a week later at two in the morning, face pale and ghostly with an awful green tinge to it that makes Severus think he might vomit all over the floor. He doesn't give the boy firewhiskey this time, instead presenting him with a glass of water which he accepts appreciatively, gulping it down until it's all gone. He no longer looks green and ill, but the ghostly pallor stays.

Severus sits him down on the couch, because he seems to be unable to do so himself, almost comatose, and fills the glass with _agumenti_ again.

"Drink this one slower, or you will make yourself sick." He tells the boy, handing the glass to him again, watching him take a short sip, swallowing it down carefully. "Would you like to talk about it?"

Potter seems to have forgotten his glasses on his way down to Severus's quarters, eyes unobstructed and unfocused. The dark emerald green of his irises remind Severus so much of Lily, and yet they are also so very different.

"You had another nightmare?" At Potter's nod, he adds, "Would you like to tell me what it was about?"

Potter stares at Severus, unseeing, yet boring into Severus's very soul. 

When the boy doesn't answer, Severus says, "You do not have to reveal the content of your nightmares, but know that I will listen and will not disclose." He sits on the other side of the couch and turns his whole body towards the boy so he will know he has Severus's whole attention.

"The holidays before my sixth year, I would ride the trains around London, just to... just to get out of my aunt and uncle's house, get out of their way. I'd do it day and night, never mind the risk to my safety." Potter takes another gulp of water. "I was out, late one night, in the last carriage of the Circle train. He was drunk, he smelt rancid, like beer and cigarette smoke and sweat. He followed me out at South Kensington, pushed me into an alcove..." He does not need to finish his sentence, Severus understands.

"Have you spoken to anyone else about this?" He asks, voice soft and kind.

"A muggle physician." Harry says, lifting his legs to his chest, face in his knees, voice muffled. "I bled on and off for a week, so I took the train to a GP in Piccadilly. He told me pain and insomnia were normal, but I was numb, and I slept for days at a time. He gave me pills for the pain and pills to sleep, and a week before Dumbledore arrived to deliver me to the Burrow I took all the pills I had left. My cousin, Dudley, he found me and he got me into the shower and had me throw up. I didn't tell him why I tried to... to kill myself, and he didn't ask. He never told anyone." 

Potter looks vulnerable, curled into a tight ball on Severus's couch, and Severus feels inclined to tell him something, about himself, something he has not told another. This boy is baring his very soul to a man he despises, telling him things that could ruin him.

"May I tell you something, and trust that you will not tell another? Not even your friends?"

Potter blinks up at him and nods.

"I understand your pain because I have felt it, and it feels like it will never leave you, but it will. I was not much older than you when I was taken advantage of, and to this day I still feel her touch on my skin, her breath on my face."

"Her?" The boy asks, so soft, like he feels that single word will incite Severus's anger.

"Yes, Potter, her." Severus answers, nodding his head once. "I had just become a Death Eater, and she decided she deserved me, as she was my better." He swallows a large lump in his throats and continues. "It seems impossible for a woman to force herself on a man, I understand, but it is entirely possible. They do not have to be strong, they do not have to hold you down, they hold you with words, and show their strength through cruelty."

Severus had not noticed he'd been crying until Potter reached forward and held Severus's face in his hand, wiping a tear away with his thumb. He stands abruptly, embarrassed, self conscious and ashamed, walking to his drinks and pouring himself a glass of firewhiskey and swallowing it all down in one go, pouring himself another, and one for the boy.

"Thank you." Potter tells Severus. By the look in his eyes, Severus is unsure whether he is being thanked for the whiskey or thanked for the confession. 

They drink in silence, and when the boy is finished, he thanks Severus again and takes his leave.

-*-*-

Severus doesn't see the boy again for almost three weeks, and he begins to wonder if he had been frightened by Severus's confession, but eventually, he does come.

When Potter arrives at Severus's door, he's wearing only his pyjama pants, chest and feet bare, and he's panting like he had run, eyes wide like some terrified animal. He pushes past Severus, into his chambers, and begins to pull books from his bookcases, reading the title and throwing them behind him with absolutely no care.

"Mister Potter! What do you think you're doing?" Severus cries, grabbing hold of the boy's bicep, trying to pull him away. He seems like in a trance, unable to speak nor hear, pulling away from Severus to continue his search of his books. "Mister Potter! Harry!"

Potter snaps out of it when he hears his name, dropping the book in his hands, blinking at Severus, and then at the mess he'd made around him. He drops to the ground in a dead faint and it takes a moment for Severus to register the shock.

He lifts the boy into his arms and carries him to his bedroom, laying him out on the bed and going to the shelf he keeps his potions on, taking the reviving potion and uncorking it, holding it under Potter's nose until his eyes blink open, eyelashes fluttering against his cheek.

"Professor?" He asks, shocked, as if he doesn't remember how he got to Severus's chambers. And perhaps he doesn't.

"Are you feeling alright, Mister Potter?"

"Where am I?" The boys asks, instead of answering Severus.

"My bedchamber. You fainted." 

"I fainted?" Potter says, sitting up, holding his hand against his forehead, staring down into his lap. "I don't understand. I was in my dorm room."

"Perhaps you have been imperviused." Severus suggests. "You acted very strangely, as if possessed."

The boys looks up at Severus in horror. "Oh God, what did I do?"

"Nothing, it is alright." Severus says, waving his hand dismissively. "Rest here a moment, I will return with water."

He leaves the boy in his bedchamber while he goes to clean up the mess, using magic to return the books to their spot in the book case, then retrieving a glass of water. He takes is back into Potter and hands it to him.

"When you came into my chambers, you began searching through my books, do you remember why?" Severus asks once Potter has had his fill. 

The boy looks horrified. "I didn't break anything, did I?"

"No, you needn't worry yourself, you broke nothing."

Potter nods, almost dazedly, and then says, "I was looking for something. A spell. A potion. I can't remember." Then he looks back up at Severus. "Why did you put me in your bed?"

Severus frowns. "I... I do not know." He replies. "Do you wish to be moved?"

Potter slides his hand over Severus's midnight blue quilt covers, a strange look in his eyes. "No. Please."

Severus nods once and sits at the edge of the bed, a strange feeling deep in the pit of his stomach at having Harry Potter in his bed. In the one room he never lets others enter. He thinks, perhaps, Potter understands.

"Are you alright, Mister Potter?"

Potter swallows. "Harry, please."

There's something in his eyes, a desperation. "Then you must also call me Severus, but only whilst we are alone."

Potter - Harry nods, eyes so very green as he stares up at Severus. "I'm sorry for barging into your rooms."

"Unnecessary. You are welcome here anytime you wish to talk."

Harry nods, suddenly very drowsy, eyes falling heavy. "Would you... do you mind if... if I just closed my eyes for a moment?"

Severus doesn't understand why he says yes so fast, getting the boy under the covers so he can sleep. He knows it won't be for a moment, he knows the risk, but he allows it to happen.

He sits in the armchair by the fire, and that's where he stays all night, watching over the boy.

-*-*-

Severus meets Harry on the way back to his quarters on his fifth visit. He'd just completed his weekly nightly rounds when he'd come across the boy tiptoeing down the stairs into the dungeons.

"Mister Potter." 

The boy jumps a half a foot in the air, swearing his shock. "Severus, Christ."

"Are you alright?" Severus asks, unable to properly make out Harry's features in the low light, signs of distress.

"I'm." The boy looks left, and then right, and then takes Severus's wrist and drags him down through the dungeons and into Severus's quarters. Severus's carefully laid wards part easily for Harry, and he doesn't know why it doesn't anger him. "I've seen Voldemort."

"What on earth do you mean?"

Harry goes to Severus's drinks cabinet and pours himself a glass of whiskey, gulping it down and pouring another. "He plans to kill you soon. I was dreaming about... something else, and then it changed. He was talking to Lucius Malfoy." Harry swallows all of the whiskey in his glass down in one go, them pours himself another. "You worry him. He thinks you're a threat. Severus, you can't go."

Severus walks to the boy and takes the glass from his hand so he won't drink it, setting it down on the cabinet's surface. "I know, Harry. I've known for a while he planned to kill me."

"Please tell me you won't go."

"I will not." Severus agrees, nodding his head. "But it will not stop him from trying."

"God, I'm so scared, all the fucking time, I can't take this much longer. The waiting." Harry says, hanging his head in his hands, breathing shakily through his fingers.

"I know, Harry." Severus says, pushing Harry's hands away, taking his face into his own. "It is alright, I am safe, and you are safe."

"For now." Harry says, leaning his face into Severus's left hand, eyelashes fluttering as he closes his eyes. The way he says it is so final, and Severus cannot argue, so instead, he runs his thumbs over Harry's cheekbones and kisses him.

It's probably his second worst idea, behind taking the dark mark, but he does it anyway, and eventually, after the shock has worn off, Harry kisses him back.

Severus can tell he's not very experienced, but he doesn't care, it isn't about that. The kiss is comfort, assurance, it's a promise that even though the world is burning at their feet, they have each other, they have this moment.

The kiss is very slow at first, but Harry takes it further, a wandering tongue and wandering hands, and a part of Severus cracks, and he's backing Harry towards his desk, swiping a hand over it to clear it of ink and quills and papers, lifting Harry on top of it and kissing him harder. 

Harry makes a delicious sound, high in his throat, when Severus sucks a spectacular bruise into his jaw, and Severus has never wanted something so much.

"Please, please," Harry begs, taking Severus's face in his hands, kissing him hurriedly. "Please fuck me, please."

Severus doesn't have enough in him to say no, so instead he lifts Harry's t-shirt over his head and licks into his mouth.

It's harder than Severus thought, ridding them of their clothing when he's much too distracted with kissing Harry, so he uses a spell to divest them of the last of it. He summons the lubricant next and slicks his fingers with it, pressing one inside the tight clutch of Harry's arsehole.

"Oh god, Severus, please." Harry begs, head tipping back against the wall with a heavy thunk. "I want you to fuck me so bad, want you to make me beg for it, make me scream."

Severus had not expected Harry's mouth to be so dirty, and it spurs him on, adding another finger to the boy's warm heat, thrusting his fingers in and out as he scissors them apart. "I am going to give it to you, Harry, you needn't worry."

Harry curls one of his hands around Severus's shoulders and digs his nails in deep until it hurts, begging over and over to be fucked, to have Severus inside him.

Severus adds another finger, until he's stretching Harry apart with three, and the boy has stopped forming words, only able to produce animalistic groans and moans Severus wants to hear forever.

"Are you ready, Harry?" Severus finally asks, suddenly becoming aware of the throbbing of his cock, heavy and insistent between his thighs.

"Yes, yes, Merlin, yes!" Harry cries, digging his fingernails deeper into Severus's skin, desperately trying to pull him closer. "I need it, I need it, I need it, I need it!"

Harry feels like heaven when Severus slides in, tight like a vice and hot as a sauna, and Severus doesn't ever want to be anywhere but inside him.

Harry's whole body bows obscenely as Severus thrusts into him, his throat bared and his chest flushed, sweat gathered at his temples. He can't speak again, can only moan and groan and scream when Severus's hips jut in just right. Severus thinks if he wasn't so proficient at silencing charms that the whole castle would hear the way Harry screams for him, and he doesn't know why that gives him such a thrill.

He gets his hands under Harry's thighs, lifting him, still inside him, and lays him on the rug in front of the fireplace, spreading his thighs further and using the new angle to shove into his prostate more harshly until he screams again.

"Harder, faster, more!" Harry demands, back arched off the floor, sliding his hands down Severus's arms, threading their fingers together, his eyes squeezed tightly shut.

"Merlin you sound amazing when you scream for me." Severus tells him, lifting their clasped hands above Harry's head, pining them to the floor. 

Harry looks a bit panicked then, and Severus let's go of his hands before he even has to speak, leaning down to kiss him hungrily, whispering apologies into his mouth.

"I have you, I won't let you go."

Harry's whole body arches in a way that must be painful when he orgasms, ejaculating over his stomach and Severus's own, screaming into the ceiling. His arsehole clutches at Severus's cock so much tighter than before, and he doesn't last much longer than Harry, coming deep inside.

They're both panting when Severus removes his softening penis from Harry's body, summoning his wand to clean them and summoning pillows and quilts for them to sleep in.

Harry falls asleep first, tucked tight against Severus's chest. Severus looks down at him and wonders while he doesn't feel a shred of remorse for sleeping with a young man twenty years his junior, his student. He just doesn't seem to care.

-*-*-

On Harry's next nightly visit, they don't speak about what had happened four nights before. Harry sits in the corner of the couch like he always has, knees up against his chest.

"Have you had another nightmare?" Severus asks, pouring them both glasses of whiskey, handing the boy his own.

Harry shakes his head. "No, it wasn't a nightmare." He takes a sip of his whiskey and stares over at Severus. "I just... today I realised something. I was sitting in the Great Hall, between my friends, and I have never felt lonelier. They ask me things, about myself, but they never want the answer, they want a lie, something pretty. I can't do it anymore."

"It is hard, is it not." Severus nods his head, staring down at the glass in his hands. "To pretend."

Harry looks up at Severus and drinks the last of his whiskey, taking Severus's own glass and puts both down on the table beside the lounge. "I don't want to pretend with you. Please, I don't want to be alone."

Severus takes Harry's face and lays him back against the couch, kissing him almost desperately. 

It doesn't take long for Severus to divulge them of their clothes and summon a jar of lubricant, slicking his fingers and getting them inside Harry.

Harry makes such lovely sounds, and Severus wants more, so much more. He wants to know what Harry sounds like when Severus strokes his tongue against his arsehole, what he sounds like when Severus sucks the boys cock into his mouth.

Later. Later.

Severus presses into the boy's tight heat, sucking a mark into the skin of his throat, and all he can do in reply is moan, scratching his nails down Severus's back, leaving lines that are sure to mark.

Severus thrusts into him as hard as he dares, rocking the lounge dangerously and swallowing Harry's moans as they kiss. He wants the boy to think of this moment every time he sits, every time he sees the bruise on his flesh, every time he sees Severus at his classroom desk, Severus wants Harry to only think of him, and this moment, where he isn't alone.

"Severus, please." Harry says, voice barely above a whisper, staring up at Severus with parted lips and pinked cheeks, the green of his irises swallowed by his pupils. 

Severus nudges the boy's nose with his own and kisses him again, picking up his pace. He gets his hand between their bodies and curls it around Harry's cock, fisting him until he comes between them, and Severus follows shortly behind.

-*-*-

Outside of the classroom and the Great Hall, the next time Severus sees Harry is at an Order meeting in the staff room. He tells them he's seen Voldemort's plans to storm the castle before school ends, and he looks at Severus with such fear that Severus's heart aches painfully in his chest.

After the meeting, Severus doesn't make it back down into his quarters in the dungeons before he's being pushed into an unused classroom and pressed back up against the door. Harry's kisses are fervent and desperate, and he's shaking like a leaf in Severus's arms, face wet with tears.

"Harry, Harry, stop." Severus says, holding the boy at arms length, hands around his biceps.

"I need it, I need it, I need you." He begs, flying at Severus again, kissing him so rough their teeth clack together painfully. "I'm sorry, I need you, I'm sorry."

"Harry, Harry, calm down." Severus says, pushing the boy away again, holding his face in his hands. "Talk to me."

"We're going to die. We're all going to die." Harry mumbles, eyes wide and wet. "We can go, leave the castle, leave The UK. We can leave Dumbledore to clean the mess he made. Please, say you'll leave with me."

"We cannot, Harry."

Harry sobs and collapses into Severus's chest, fingers tight in his cloak. "I know, I know we can't. It's not fair."

"It is not." Severus agrees, holding the boy tight against him. "It is not fair, and yet we must bare it with dignity."

Harry blinks wet, green eyes up at Severus and says, "I need it, please. I need you more than I've ever needed anything in my entire life."

Severus switches their positions and presses Harry to the door, lifting him so he can wrap his legs around Severus's hips. He takes the boy's face in one hand, the other holding him up, and kisses him until they're both breathless.

They don't get naked, they push clothing aside, and Severus slicks his penis and Harry's arsehole, and then he's pushing in, taking Harry like they both want it, both need it.

Severus realised later, when they've returned to his quarters, and Harry's asleep beside him, that anyone could have walked in on them, then, anyone could have seen him in the throes of a sexual encounter with his student, but he finds he doesn't care.

-*-*-

Severus is woken up by Harry sliding into bed with him, curling around his back, completely nude, cock half hard. He doesn't remember giving Harry access to his wards, but at this point, he's probably done it unconsciously.

His skin is cold, and a wandering hand brings a shiver from Severus.

"It is early."

"I know." Harry replies, pressing his hand to Severus's chest, over his heart, fingers digging uncomfortably into his skin.

"Did you have another nightmare?" Severus replies, sliding his arm under the pillow and under his head, placing his hand over Harry's, settling it, so it's flat over his skin.

"Can't have nightmares when you don't sleep." Harry says nonchalantly, threading his fingers in Severus's chest hair. 

He pulls at it until it stings and Severus turns around so they're facing each other, eyebrow raised.

"I'm not in love with you or anything, if you're worried about it." Harry says, hand under his cheek as he stares at Severus. "Don't think I could ever do that. Fall in love."

"I am not worried about it." Severus replies. "I do not believe I could ever fall in love either."

"Okay. As long as we're on the same page." Harry says, pushing Severus onto his back and sliding on top of him. "I'm not in love with you, but I still want to run away with you. I just wanna run away. And I don't want to be alone. I know you feel the same."

Severus brushes the boy's hair from his eyes, curling it behind his ears. "I do."

"Can we go? If we survive? Leave the UK?"

Severus runs his thumb over Harry's cheekbone, staring into his eyes. He's afraid. Severus does not know what of this time. Perhaps being left at the foot of the mess, alone. "We can go."

Harry nods. "Okay. Good." He leans down and kisses Severus, slowly, like he's got all the time in the world.

-*-*-

The battle begins at two in the morning. Severus and Harry are awoken to a harried knocking at Severus's chamber doors. 

"Don't-" Harry tries to say when Severus pulls himself out of bed, hand around his wrist in a vice-like grip. "Don't go."

Severus leans down and presses his mouth to Harry's, before pulling out of his grip and climbing out of bed. He pulls on his dressing gown, finds his wand and pads through his quarters to the front door, where Minerva is waiting.

"Sorry for waking you so early, Severus. They're here. It's time." She says, frantic, eyes like a wild cat's, afraid and angry.

"Understood. I will meet you downstairs momentarily." He behind to shut his door, before he stops and says, "I will retrieve Mister Potter."

Minerva frowns suspiciously, but she doesn't argue.

"It's started, hasn't it?" Harry asks when Severus returns to his bedroom. He's sitting up on the bed, back against the headboard, knees up against his chest.

"Yes."

“Afterwards...” Harry starts to say, then stops himself, laying his cheek over his knee and staring up at Severus, eyes so, so green, but so dull and lifeless. “We’ll go. If we...”

Severus has no plans to survive this war, and he doesn’t believe for a moment Harry will either, but he nods his head anyway. “The shrieking shack. We will meet there, and we will go.”

Severus can see very clearly that Harry doesn’t expect they’ll survive either, but he holds out hope. The last of his childhood, a glimmer of hope that sparks like wildfire behind his eyes. 

Severus leans down and uses his fingers to turn Harry’s up towards him. He thinks the kids is supposed to be a comfort, for both of them, but Severus feels nothing but hollow.

They seperate at the top of the dungeon stairs, Harry to go in search of his friends, and Severus to find the other teachers.

-*-*-

It’s bloody. It’s a mess of blood and bodies and spells and green lightening, and it doesn’t end until dawn’s broken. 

Severus is alive. He wasn’t expecting that.

He had almost died, in the shrieking shack, after Nagini’s bite, but Harry had been so determined not to let him, the stubborn brat, and admittedly, Hermione Granger really was the smartest witch of her age.

He doesn’t leave the shrieking shack, he doesn’t believe he could face the rest of the world after his close brush with death, and he must wait. For Harry. 

He only knows it’s over when his forearm begins to burn like he’s holding it over a hot stove.

He watches with rapt attention as the mark on his skin begins to blur and then the ink slides down to his fingers, dripping onto floorboards, burning it like acid. It’s excruciating, but once it’s over, Severus realises he’s never been so grateful in his entire life.

He continues to wait.

He watches the sun rise further in the sky through the glass windows of the shack.

He doesn’t know how long he waits, hours maybe, and suddenly he realises he’d never planned to be the only one to survive. Where would he go? What would he do?

He decides he’s waited long enough. He’s taking his wand out, ready to apparate when Harry bursts into the room, panting and red cheeked, covered in dirt with a gash across his chin and another over his eyebrow. 

He reaches out for Severus, grasping his arm and yelling, “ _Go, go, go!_ ” Severus briefly hears voices calling Harry’s name in the distance.

He apparates them away.

-*-*-

**Author's Note:**

> I don’t think I’ll write a sequel to this, particularly not one in where Harry and Severus get together. I started writing this in early July of 2017 when I was first coming to grips with being aromantic. I needed to write something that expressed how I felt about relationships and falling in love, but I also needed to write how I felt about needing strong connections with others, whether sex was involved or not.


End file.
